Alcohol consumption at city beach and bay parking lots will be prohibited under an emergency ordinance that is expected to be adopted today by the San Diego City Council. The ordinance, which was introduced by Councilman Mike Gotch and is supported by the Police Department, is intended to curb increasing citizen complaints of drinking and rowdy behavior by youngsters at five parking lots in and around Mission Bay Park and other city beachfront communities.

Kim Mulkey-Robertson, in her third season coaching at Baylor, hears all the snide remarks. Of how the Bears play a creampuff nonconference schedule. Or that getting bounced in the second round of last year's NCAA tournament proved that they didn't deserve the No. 7 ranking -- despite the fact Baylor won 26 games and finished second in the Big 12 Conference behind Oklahoma. And that Baylor will never finish strong in March because the Bears aren't toughened in November and December.

Residents of Del Mar and Solana Beach have recently been offered a deal they can't refuse: cut-rate ear plugs, free "relocation" out of their homes for two weekends and a resident biologist to sit in the lagoon to monitor the effects of noise on the creatures that inhabit that sanctuary. Some may ask how did this happen? How could this happen? How could two small residential communities suddenly find their tranquility, their quality of life, shattered?

Wade Boggs reached 3,000 hits, but that achievement didn't change Kirk Gibson's feelings about the Tampa Bay Devil Ray third baseman. "When he kissed home plate, I rolled my eyes," said Gibson, the former Dodger hero who is now a Detroit Tiger broadcaster. "That was vintage Wade. That's the reason he doesn't get respect. He's me-me, I-I. I don't take away his 3,000 hits, that's a great achievement. But it takes 25 guys to win a championship."

If the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals expanded its concerns to include humans, there would have been pickets all around the Irvine Meadows Amphitheatre on Friday night. The volume was so painfully high during the three-hour heavy-metal concert that any thinking person in the first 40 rows should have been wearing ear plugs. But, of course, no one did. Part of the lure of the heavy-metal ritual is the sense of reckless abandon.

While most Southern Californians spend New Year's Day watching the Rose Parade or college football games on TV, a few hundred avid beach-goers will celebrate the holiday by plunging into the chilly Pacific Ocean. The Cabrillo Beach Polar Bears, a group of more than 100 ocean swimmers, will sponsor its 42nd annual New Year's Day Swim in the waters off San Pedro. About 350 people are expected to strip down to their bathing suits and take the plunge Saturday, said club President Ray Falk, 71.

It makes sense when you think about it. Lauren Schwartz of Moorpark points out that a concert by Jack Mack & the Heart Attack was sponsored by Encino Tarzana Regional Medical Center. I forgot to ask if the audience received wrist tags at the gate. Which reminds me: Evelyn Hill of Malibu noticed that the restaurant in the Santa Monica Medical Plaza parking structure is named the Cutting Board.

A teenager who used ear plugs before fatally shooting his mother--something he told investigators he should have done years earlier--was convicted of second-degree murder Wednesday. Jurors took the middle ground in the verdict against Joseph Davidson. Prosecutors had sought first-degree murder because Davidson deliberately killed his adoptive mother, while the defense asked for manslaughter, arguing Davidson was abused by her and mentally deficient.

Pete Townshend, the guitarist for the legendary British rock band the Who, has it bad. So does guitar virtuoso Jeff Beck, so bad that he once said he had to listen to a portable headset all the time because it "diverts the mental strain." Ted Nugent, the Detroit rocker who played "Cat Scratch Fever" at head-banging levels, now says the only useful purpose his left ear serves is to balance his face.

Detroit Piston center Bison Dele, formerly known as Brian Williams, has been a slow-moving bison. Dele was fined $1,000 for missing the team bus to a game March 6 in Orlando. Dele then went out and missed 11 of 17 shots in a loss to the Magic, his former team. He is so disliked in Orlando that the Magic plays a recording of a mooing cow every time he touches the ball. "It's the worst place for me," Dele said of Orlando. "I have never played well down there. Just too much bad blood."